JFK's tree

My dad found a video of Kennedy's tree-planting visit (see previous blog entry). Cool to see, now that I've been there. Thanks for the sleuthing Dad!

Thanksgiving weekend

My parents (finally!) came over for the long weekend. We had told them we live in a Winnebago, so they were in no hurry to come and visit. Kidding... we said it was a VW bus! Anyhoo...

Dad has some foot pain currently, so I imagine he didn't love the stairs... or all the other walking we made him do :).

We all enjoyed a good weekend. Carrie whipped up an awesome chicken thanksgiving dinner (no offense turkeys, but I'm much more thankful for chicken). We played some games, did some visiting on Sunday, and enjoyed some nice mild weather.

On Monday we went out and saw some sights. Rideau Hall is just a couple of minutes from our place. It's the Governor General's official residence, and the queen's when she's in town; it's also where foreign heads of state and ambassadors are received and where prime ministers and cabinet members are sworn in.


The 88 acres of grounds are nicely kept. Throughout the part where we wandered around, there were many trees planted by foreign monarchs and other heads of state. This is JFK's tree, planted in 1961.


The fall colours were beautiful; we couldn't have picked a better time to visit the place.





We also visited Parliament Hill, but we didn't do a tour this time around.


We did go up the Peace Tower, which gives a nice view of a really flat city. I can see our house from here!


The East Block of Parliament.


The clock face that we can see from our place. And I'm finally close enough to tell what time it is.


Overlooking the Ottawa River and the faraway land of Quebec. Library of Parliament in the foreground.


We also ventured into Gatineau Park in Quebec. Colours weren't as spectacular as at Rideau Hall, and it was insanely busy on the roads in the park.



Kinda cute, n'est-ce pas?

woohoo road trip!

To Neerlandia. Or not... the drive across is less than stellar, so we'll probably fly. My wee little brother just got engaged... congratulations Richard & Fenilyn! It's about time dude... you're already in your twenties.

*sniff* they grow up so fast.

cool concepts

Since I have nothing better to blog about, here's a concept for those people who love monster trucks but feel compelled to be environmentally friendly...



Here's some more Smart-car-inspired interbreeding results (presumably à la Photoshop, unlike the above).

Smorche:


Smorvette:


Smamborghini:


Smerrari:


I guess that makes our first one a smonster truck.

New dog

So we got ourselves a new dog. Not quite the rottweiler I wanted, but if I put up with this one, I'll reward myself with an entire fleet of rotties!

The name's Daisy. Why? Who knows. I vetoed a few other names, so if you think Daisy is a dumb dog name, let me assure you there are many lousier ones.

She yells a lot at night when we sequester her in her cage in the basement. Well, cries really. It's a good thing that room's fairly fairly soundproof and a hundred floors down.

But really, it's kinda hard to be mad at this. Well okay, not hard at all, but it's hard to stay mad.


She naps like a people...


She loves tags on anything. Forget the toys themselves... the tags get mangled first!


Aren't those the darndest dog bowls? One was a gift and the other one Carrie bought.


We got her last Friday and finally the balance of indoor vs outdoor peeing/pooing is shifting. And to think we'd given up hope by day 3. Puppies are great to have as they provide hours of mindless entertainment. Is it worth the hassle? I'll get back to you on that. Either way, it's a 12ish-year commitment. Sigh... too late now.

Concertbirthdaygolfing

Titles are not an easy thing.

Apparently my latest blitz of blogging wasn't enough, so I've been goaded into writing another post already. Usually when I don't blog it's because either too much or too little has happened. Generally it's too little but not this time.

Two weekends ago, a group of 10 of us went to the NAC to enjoy Mozart's Requiem. It was nicely performed, the choir of 150+ actually made up of three separate choirs. Beforehand some of us went to Milestones for dinner, and after the performance we went out again for a snack.

The same day we got some peaches from friends, so those had to be dealt with shortly as they were already more than ripe. Tuesday was Carrie's birthday, so Monday and Tuesday were very busy with doing the peaches (canning, jam and salsa) and preparing for Tuesday evening.

The birthday party was busy but fun. A total of 23 people fit in the house and Carrie prepared food like it was going out of style. Yum! (She thinks next time we'll do things differently since she hardly found time to sit down.)

On Saturday a dozen guys from church went out for the annual day of golf. Against my better judgment, I was one of the twelve. Fortunately I expected to come in dead last so I fully met my expectations; I got dangerously near my typical bowling score, and I'm not the worst bowler.

My group of four happened to include me and the guy who scored the best overall. He beat me by a mere 56 strokes. Next time I'll surely beat him.


And two other guys who -- needless to say -- kicked my butt as well.


We lost a lot of golf balls, but we found more. (In one spot we found 17 in short order and quit looking only in the interest of time.) We also found this sweet garter snake. Good times!


After that it was off to a delicious barbecue that was totally worth the painful golf experience.

BC trip - part 173

Man, blogging takes forever. Now for the event that actually brought us to BC... the wedding.

The wedding of Daryl and Lydia occurred right at the end of our vacation. Since we are family of the groom, Carrie's side of the family was not quite as busy as in the past when the girls got married. This made for a slightly more relaxing time.

Unfortunately it rained most of the day of the wedding. Fortunately they decided to get hitched anyway and lived happily ever after.



The wedding was held in Willoughby church. Some humorous craziness ensued immediately following the ceremony: since it was raining outside and there wasn't much room outside the auditorium for congratulating the happy couple, as soon as they walked out down the aisle they came right back in up the other aisle. They'd been briefed to come back in for hand-shaking but many of the rest of us were thoroughly confused. A rerun? Photographers didn't catch them the first time?

The reception was held in a large warehouse at the bride's father's greenhouse. A section was nicely closed off for the evening, since we didn't need the whole 100,000 square feet.


Gary the chef did a remarkable job on the delicious appetizers and a four-course meal.


There was plenty of entertainment over the course of the evening, and not even any skits! One highlight was a performance of The Phantom of the Greenhouse. The participants truly did justice to the pieces sung; very impressive.


Mmmm... cake. Come to think of it, I didn't even have any! (Did anyone?)


Congrats Mr. & Mrs. Driegen!